Seventy-seven heifers weighing about 200 kg were assigned randomly to intact control (C), ovariectomized (OVX) immunized against estradiol (BSA-E), BSA-E + trenbolone acetate (BSA-E + TBA), TBA or ovx + TBA groups. The objective of the study was to determine the effects of ovariectomy, immunoneutralization of estradiol and trenbolone acetate treatment on growth rate and carcass merit. Heifers w...

The study examined the growth performance of pigs offered liquid feed or dry feed on either a restricted or an ad libitum basis, and whether their growth performance was further influenced by the water-to-feed ratio. The study was split into two parts to enable unrestricted (trial 1; n = 64) and restricted (trial 2; n = 48) feeding to be compared. Male pigs were randomly allocated to six dietar...

Three feed additives were tested to improve the growth and health of pigs chronically challenged with aflatoxin (AF) and deoxynivalenol (DON). Gilts (n = 225, 8.8 ± 0.4 kg) were allotted to five treatments: CON (uncontaminated control); MT (contaminated with 150 µg/kg AF and 1100 µg/kg DON); A (MT + a clay additive); B (MT + a clay and dried yeast additive); and C (MT + a clay and yeast culture...

BACKGROUND Porcine circovirus 2 is the primary agent responsible for inducing a group of associated diseases known as Porcine Circovirus Associated Diseases (PCVAD), which can have detrimental effects on production efficiency as well as causing significant mortality. The objective of this study was to evaluate variation in viral replication, immune response and growth across pigs (n = 974) from...

Four experiments were conducted to investigate the effect of organic or inorganic acid supplementation on the growth performance, nutrient digestibility, intestinal measurements and white blood cell counts of weanling pigs. In growth trial (Exp I), a total of 100 crossbred pigs ({Landrace×Yorkshire}×Duroc), weaned at 23±2 days of age and 7.25±0.10 kg average initial body weight (BW), were allot...

Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the effects of providing a water-soluble globulin in the drinking water on growth performance of weanling pigs. In Exp. 1, 360 weanling pigs (5.0 +/- 1.2 kg; 17 +/- 3 d of age; PIC) were blocked by initial weight and allotted to one of six treatments in a 2 x 3 factorial arrangement. Treatments included three diet complexity regimens with or without wa...

Abstract The objective of the study was to assess effect varying levels water deprivation on growth performance, carcass characteristics, and internal organ weight broiler chickens. Ninety unsexed Ross 308 chicks 2 weeks old were randomly assigned five periods 0, 6, 12, 18, 24 h. Each treatment replicated three times with six birds per replicate. Broiler chickens given ad libitum (0 h) or for 3...

Maize-soybean meal diets with 0, 100, 200 and 300 g/kg double zero rapeseed meal (‘00’ RSM) with and without an enzyme mixture (xylanase, pectinase, cellulase) at a level of 1.6 g/kg were evaluated with 624 day-old broiler chicks for 5 weeks. The birds were randomly allocated to eight dietary treatments with three replicates of 26 birds each. Average daily gain (ADG) and feed intake (FI) were r...

The study aimed to compare MspI polymorphisms in the 3rd intron of the porcine gene encoding the pituitary-1 transcription factor (Pit-1, renamed as POU1F1) among 5 breeds and to determine the associations between its genotypes and growth performance in a commercial pig population by using the PCR-RFLP technique. Significant differences in genotypic and allelic frequencies were found between th...

Abstract Heat-stressed livestock exhibit systemic inflammation, which likely contributes to poor growth and metabolism even when nutritional effects are controlled by pair feeding. Thus, heat stress-induced deficits in growth, metabolism, well-being may be improved moderating heightened inflammation. Our objective was determine whether targeting inflammation administering anti-inflammatory dexa...